


Muddle Through Somehow

by andthewasp



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Christmas fic, M/M, idk what else to tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-29
Updated: 2019-11-29
Packaged: 2021-02-13 12:08:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21494053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andthewasp/pseuds/andthewasp
Summary: Eddie hates the holidays. Richie loves them. Despite this, Eddie finds more things to like about Richie than he originally thought.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 3
Kudos: 35





	Muddle Through Somehow

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this fic last year for the reddie secret santa, and i recently realized that it was never posted on ao3. and it’s officially been one whole day since thanksgiving so i’m already deep in christmas cheer. hope you all have a wonderful holiday season!!

Eddie had never really liked Christmas, all things considered. The decorations were annoying, the music was dull and repetitive, peppermint was gross, and the concept of Santa just seemed creepy. The Christmas of his childhood wasn’t the commercial, happy one that was constantly shoved in his face nowadays, either, filled more with awkward silence and advent candles.

Beverly and Ben’s annual Christmas party got bigger and bigger every year, and by the time they were well into two years of marriage and owned their own apartment, it was less of a casual affair between their small group of friends and more of a legitimate, adult house party, complete with their coworkers, extended family, and hors d'oeuvres. They had a real Christmas tree! And lights were strung up around the house and on the lamppost in front of the house, like they were in one of the movies they used to mock and take a shot every time something cliche happened on screen.

Back when Christmas hadn’t been so bad, when the six of them were in college and the party was just them, several bottles of alcohol, and shitty made-for-tv Christmas movies, Eddie had almost looked forward to this night.

Eddie looked wistfully over at Stanley and Mike, who were pouring drinks into clear glasses, not red solo cups like they once had. “I at least had hope that you’d be just as miserable as me.”

Stan, who was wearing a sweater that read ‘HAPPY HANUKKAH YA FILTHY SCHMUCK’ over a pristine white collared shirt, shrugged and passed his boyfriend a glass. “It’s fun.”

“I think Bev is starting to call it a non-denominational-holiday party,” Mike chimed in, looking pointedly out the door of the kitchen where the hustle and bustle of the party was. “But that might’ve been to piss off her ‘put the Christ back in Christmas’ boss.”

Speaking of, Eddie needed to call his mother. Sonia Kasprak was probably wasting away sitting by her phone, waiting for her son to call and wish her a merry Christmas Eve. Eddie’s face must have shown some sign, as Stan reaches over to pat his back. “Don’t think too hard about it, Eddie. Just drink and have fun.”

The pair left the kitchen after that, into the party that Eddie felt worse about attending by the second.

Eddie followed, unsure of what else he could do, awkwardly waving a hand or muttering hello to those he recognized and some he didn’t, towards the couches where those he really knew were sitting.

On the couches, Bill and Ben were talking animatedly to each other, probably about some building Ben is designing or an article that Bill has had published. Next to them were Audra and Beverly, looking lovingly at their husbands over glasses of wine. A familiar figure was splayed across the armchair, one long leg tossed over the arm and the other up on the coffee table, a Santa hat pulled over most of his face. Eddie knew who it was immediately, the curly black hair splayed underneath the Santa hat and trashy converse dead giveaways.

Eddie doesn’t know Richie Tozier, per se. Eddie knows him just about as well as Eddie knows the Queen of England, or Jake Gyllenhaal. That was to say, Eddie knew very little about Richie Tozier and also knew a great deal — like his curly hair and crooked teeth are immensely charming — but doesn’t know how he takes his coffee or if he has any opinions on Olympic figure skating. Eddie didn’t even know how Beverly and Ben knew Richie, only that he started showing up around their house a year ago and never really left.

“Hey Richie,” said Stan, leaning over and flicking the white ball at the end of the hat. Eddie took a long drink of whatever Mike had made him (thankfully no peppermint), looking at Richie as the man in question tugged the hat off his head and shoved his glasses back onto his face.

“Stan my man! I didn’t know the party had arrived.” Richie threw a careless arm up into the air, almost smacking Ben’s mother in the face. “L’Chaim!”

Stan and Mike sat on the floor between the couch and the armchair, leaving Eddie hovering awkwardly. Richie exchanged pleasantries with Mike and Stan briefly, before looking to Eddie. “Spaghetti! It’s been a while since I’ve seen you!” Richie swung his arm out again in an attempt to grab Eddie, but was too far away and nearly slipped out of the chair.

Eddie racked his memory to remember the last time he saw Richie. They’d only met a handful of times, the most recent being Richie passed out on the Hanscom’s couch, only awoken to Eddie dropping off some paperwork for Beverly. (They hadn’t said much to each other. Richie said that Bev and Ben weren’t home. Eddie gave Richie the paperwork and told him to have Bev call him. Richie, still slightly drunk from the previous night, had dropped all the paper on the table and fallen back asleep)

“It’s Eddie,” he said, choosing not to think about how little he really knew about Richie outside of all the times they’d run into each other in varying states of drunkness. They shared a long, lingering look before Eddie turned away, back towards the kitchen and far away from romantic holiday air of the living room.

-

The tiny balcony outside of Ben and Beverly’s apartment was cold, but at least it was absent of Christmas cheer. Snow was falling over the city of New York, lightly and not even enough to stick on the ledge, but it was a nice distraction.

The door behind him could be heard sliding open and closed, All I Want For Christmas Is You becoming louder for a few moments before quieting again. “I think I’m going to leave soon,” Eddie starts, looking over his shoulder expecting to see Bev, or Mike. He doesn’t expect to see Richie Tozier looking at him with a cocky smirk.

“Mariah Carey not your style?” Richie sat down in the metal chair next to Eddie, kicking his feet up against the brick ledge.

“Christmas music, in general, isn’t my style.”

Richie looks aghast. “At all? No Frosty the Snowman or Blue Christmas?”

“No.” Eddie forces his gaze away from Richie, who is being swallowed by a green army coat that he wasn’t wearing earlier. At least the Santa hat is gone. If Eddie closed his eyes and forced his brain away from this stupid balcony, he could almost pretend he was at home by himself and it wasn’t Christmas eve anymore.

“What about How The Grinch Stole Christmas? You’re acting a lot like him.” Eddie rolled his eyes and kicked at one of the legs of the chair Richie was on. “Oh, come on. There’s gotta be a Christmas song you like.”

Eddie gave Richie a flat look. “Why are you out here?”

Shrugging, Richie glances over at him. Blue eyes meet Eddie’s brown ones. “Cause I feel like it. Why do you hate me?”

The question is abrupt, making Eddie’s eyebrows shoot up. He sputters a little, then, “I don’t hate you.”

“You act like you do.”

“I don’t know you!”

Richie sits up and leans over the ledge, looking down at the empty street below them. He doesn’t sound angry, or upset. Just curious. “I’d like you to know me.”

Eddie feels the urge to kick his chair again. “I still don’t understand why you’re out here.”

Throwing his hands up again, Richie looks over at him. There’s a smile on his face. “That’s what someone who hates me would say!”

“You’re impossible.”

“Come on, ask me anything.”

Quiet befalls them. Eddie isn’t sure what to say. After a few minutes pass, neither of them moving to further the conversation (Eddie too nervous, Richie seemingly content to sit in uncomfortable silence), Eddie stands. “Well, I’m going to leave now.”

Richie stands too. “I’ll walk with you.” His smile lights up the dimly lit balcony. “We’re going to be friends even if I die trying, Spaghetti.”

-

Eddie very quickly learns that Richie talks endlessly. That’s not so much a surprise, they’ve met on multiple occasions, after all, but he hadn’t been expecting this. Incessant babble and chatter. As soon as they’re out of the building Richie launches into the story of the time he met a magician in the park around the corner, or when he got food poisoning from the Thai restaurant a few blocks over. Eddie isn’t bothered so much. It’s a nice distraction.

Every once in a while Richie reaches up and shakes the snow out of his curly hair. Eddie isn’t ashamed to admit that it’s cute.

“So,” Richie starts after he finishes explaining his brief stint as his high school football team’s quarterback, “thought of a Christmas song you like yet?”

“Surprisingly, no.” Eddie kicks a chunk of snow across the sidewalk and into the road, watching as it breaks into pieces. “No such exist.”

Richie steps in front of Eddie, stopping both of them in their tracks. Richie takes advantage of their height difference and grabs Eddie by the shoulders, shaking him. “Edward Joseph Kasprak—”

“Not my middle name.”

“—I swear to God by the end of the night, not only will we be very best friends, you will like a Christmas song.”

Eddie wiggled himself free and stepped around Richie. “Whatever you say. Say, how do you take your coffee?”

Turns out Richie Tozier takes his coffee with extensive cream and sugar. The twenty-four-hour coffee shop is luckily open, but Eddie and Richie are the only customers at ten pm on Christmas Eve. They leave quickly after they get their drinks, not wanting to bother the poor teenage girl behind the counter who looked ready to commit second-degree murder when they walked in.

“Do you have any opinions on Olympic figure skating?” asks Eddie, once Richie has fallen back into step with him after holding the door open.

Richie doesn’t hesitate to answer. “I have a framed photo of Tonya Harding.” Eddie snorts into his coffee. Richie continues, “okay, maybe not, but I do love that woman.”

They sit on a bench and drink their coffee, Richie naming as many Christmas songs as he can find.

“Most Wonderful Time Of The Year?”

“It’s not.”

“Last Christmas?”

“It’s basically every other breakup song, why does it have to be Christmas themed?”

“Dominic The Donkey?”

Eddie rolled his eyes as he took a long sip.

“Jingle Bells? Sleigh Ride?”

“Sleigh bells are tacky.”

“Silver Bells.”

“Blegh. Reminds me of my mother.”

“Baby It’s cold outside.”

“Rape-y.”

“Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas.”

Pause. Eddie thinks for a moment. Then, “don’t know it.”

Richie, who had been scrolling through a list on his phone, honest to God, throws the damn thing. Eddie jumps at the sound of the phone hitting the concrete, his fingers tightening around the paper cup. “Jesus Christ, why did you do that?”

Richie walks over to grab it from where it landed by a trash can. The screen doesn’t appear any more cracked than it had been, which was to say, it was cracked quite a bit, but Richie doesn’t seem so bothered. Instead, he sits back on the bench, closer to Eddie than he was previously. “I can’t believe you don’t know this one.” He hums a high and sweet tune, looking expectantly at Eddie.

Shrugging his shoulders, Eddie leans his head back to look towards the sky so his face won’t be so close to Richie’s.

“We are listening to this right the fuck now.”

Eddie could feel Richie’s breath on his neck, and his arm on his back where it rested on the back of the bench. Snowflakes landed on his face, the warm flush of his cheeks causing them to melt immediately. Eddie wondered if Richie was having the same hyper-awareness.

Apparently not, as the song in question started to play once Richie pulled it up on his phone, tinny and small through the speakers.

_Have yourself a merry little Christmas, let your heart be light, next year all our troubles will be out of sight. Have yourself a merry little Christmas, make the yuletide gay. Next year all our troubles will be miles away._

Eddie finally looked back down at Richie, who was humming along. His glasses were foggy.

“I like it,” said Eddie, looking away and focusing on the music. It was sweet. Wasn’t commercialized or overdone or extraordinary. Eddie could close his eyes and imagine himself wrapped up in a blanket by the fire, Richie beside him telling him stories, this song playing on a record far away.

Jesus, Richie was turning him soft. They hadn’t even really been friends two hours ago. Now, Eddie felt like he knew more about Richie than any other person he’d met. He knew about the route Richie takes to work, how he met Beverly on the long train ride, and his two cats (“Thor and Loki, cutest cats in the world. Don’t tell Loki he’s adopted, though.”). Minute details, like Richie’s habit of tugging on the curls that hang around the right side of his face, or that his phone password was 742443, but he messes it up a lot.

“You’ve officially accomplished one of your goals tonight,” Eddie whispered once the song was over and Richie was shoving his phone into his coat pocket.

“What, are we not best friends yet?”

Eddie hums.

“There will be a quiz at the end of the night, Edward. You better hit the books.” Richie jumps as Eddie hits his arm. “Not what I meant.”

As he goes to stand, Eddie extends his hand. “We’re almost to my apartment. And it’s almost midnight, which means that it’s almost Christmas.”

Richie’s eyebrows raise and he doesn’t comment right away. Instead, he slides his cold fingers into Eddie’s and follows his lead. He waits until after they’ve turned the corner to say, “why do you hate Christmas so much?”

Thinking, Eddie tries to keep himself grounded by focusing on Richie’s hand, its warmth slowly starting to spread from where they connect and through Eddie’s body. “The Christmas of my childhood was always just my mother shoving religion down my throat. In high school and college it always seemed so lonely, the one time of the year where everyone was busy doing things with their family, so I was stuck with my mother. It’s just never felt like the good thing that everyone chopped it up to be.” It hadn’t always been so bad. After college, there were some Christmases where Eddie and his friends sat on the floor of empty apartments and ate shitty Chinese food, playing drinking games to Hallmark Christmas movies and exchanging homemade gifts because they were fresh out of school and too poor to buy anything. “Some were okay,” Eddie finished, sniffing awkwardly.

Richie nodded understandably, and didn’t push any further. “At least now you’ve got Judy Garland and me to put up with on Christmas.”

Eddie could feel his cheeks turning pink. “Yeah, I guess I do.”

They were quiet until they reached the building, then stood outside the building, looking up at it with their hands still clasped. Richie glanced at his phone, then looked over at Eddie. The snow stopped falling not too long ago, but Richie still runs his hand nervously through his hair, shaking away the snow that isn’t there.

Richie speaks first. “I’ll see you later, right?”

Eddie turns to face him, unable to hide the smile anymore. “We’re best friends, of course you will.”

Richie sets a hand on Eddie’s shoulder, shaking him lightly. “You get out of the quiz this time, Kaspbrak.” They share a long look, one of many throughout the night. Eddie nudges his way closer until they’re pressed flush against each other, only their bulky coats between them. They meet halfway, Eddie pushing up on his toes and Richie leaning down, their lips pressing together. It’s chaste, but warm and soft and perfect.

They pull away, with quiet promises to talk later. Richie kisses him once more, a bit more desperate this time, then stalks off in the other direction, yelling something about Eddie receiving a passing grade. Eddie really can’t keep the smile off his face this time, and wonders why they hadn’t been doing that all these months.

Once inside the building, in the lobby decked out in holiday decorations, Eddie thinks that maybe Christmas isn’t as bad as he thought.

**Author's Note:**

> my tumblr: andthwasp
> 
> title comes from have yourself a merry little christmas, by judy garland


End file.
